The Jones Financial Cos., which owns investment management firm Edward D. Jones & Co., is set to see its longtime top lawyer Christopher Lewis retire next year.
Lewis plans to retire as of March 1, 2023, according to a Dec. 13 securities filing by Edward Jones’ parent company. He has served as general counsel for the St. Louis-based financial services company since 2015.
The company has yet to announce a replacement for Lewis, according to a spokeswoman for Edward Jones. He is currently a member of the enterprise leadership team at Edward Jones and its audit committee.
Lewis didn’t respond to a request for comment about his decision to retire.
In recent years, Lewis has received accolades for his work championing diversity, equity, and inclusion at Edward Jones, the company said. Earlier this year, Lewis was one of two inaugural recipients of a DEI award given by the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association, according to Edward Jones.
Lewis is a member of the Black General Counsel 2025 Initiative, seeking to increase the number of Black law department leaders.
He has run Edward Jones’ legal team as the company faced litigation from Black and female financial advisers.
A class action filed against Edward Jones in September accused the firm of paying women less than their male financial adviser counterparts. The filing came after Edward Jones was hit with another discrimination lawsuit earlier this year. Both cases followed a $58 million settlement last year by Edward Jones with a group of Black former financial advisers.
Ogletree, Deakins, Nash, Smoak & Stewart and St. Louis-based Dowd Bennett are representing Edward Jones in both lawsuits. The two law firms have collectively more than 23% of the litigation caseload for Edward Jones in US federal courts within the past five years, according to Bloomberg Law data.
The in-house legal team led by Lewis has also had other changes in recent months.
In April, St. Louis-based packaged foods maker Post Holdings Inc. hired longtime Edward Jones lawyer and former associate general counsel and legal operations leader Dessa Kopp as its vice president of talent management.
Her exit came after Edward Jones hired a trio of new associate general counsel in Damarr Butler, Sye Hickey, and Cullen Kuhn, all of whom left Big Law to go in-house.
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